😎👍🏼🗽BIPARTISAN COMMON SENSE IMMIGRATION REFORM BILL FROM MAINE — SENS. COLLINS (R-ME), KING (I-ME), REP. PINGREE (D-ME) PROPOSE SPEED-UP IN WORK AUTHORIZATION FOR ASYLUM APPLICANTS!

Rachel Ohm
Education Reporter
Portland (ME) Press Herald
PHOTO: Portland Press Herald

From the Portland Press Herald:

https://www.pressherald.com/2022/02/17/sen-collins-introduces-bill-to-help-asylum-seekers-obtain-jobs-more-quickly/

POLITICS Posted Yesterday at 7:52 PM Updated at 8:00 AM

Sen. Collins introduces bill to help asylum seekers get jobs sooner

The legislation, co-sponsored by Sen. Angus King, would make asylum seekers eligible to receive work authorization 30 days after applying for asylum.

BY RACHEL OHMSTAFF WRITER

Sens. Susan Collins and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., introduced legislation Thursday to shorten the waiting period before asylum seekers are allowed to receive work authorizations.

The bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Angus King, would reduce the waiting period for work authorization eligibility to 30 days after an application for asylum is filed. It comes shortly after Rep. Chellie Pingree introduced a similar proposal in the House.

“The law currently prohibits asylum seekers from working for extended periods of time, which prevents them from supporting themselves and their families as they want to do. It also inadvertently places the burden of care on states and municipalities,” Collins, a Republican, said in a news release.

The bill comes as Maine is seeing an influx of asylum seekers to Portland, many of whom are being housed in hotels paid for with state and federal funds because of a lack of shelter space and available housing. For the week ending Feb. 5, Portland was housing 189 families, a total of 639 people, in hotels.

“Our bipartisan legislation would permit these individuals to work and contribute to the local economy while their asylum claims are being adjudicated,” Collins said. “This commonsense bill would help cities like Portland and their partners in the nonprofit community that are currently caring for a large number of asylum seekers.”

. . . .

**************************

Read the rest of Rachel’s report at the link. Notably, Senator Krysten Sinema (D-AZ) was also one of the sponsors.

As Senator King says: “Maine has always welcomed asylum seekers, who have made our communities stronger and richer – but current federal laws are blocking these people from pursuing a job to help them support their families and contribute to their local economies!”

The current work authorization bill system for asylum applicants and other migrants seeking relief from the hopelessly backlogged USCIS or equally out of control Immigration Courts was left in complete shambles by the “malicious incompetence” of the Trump White Nationalist immigration bureaucracy. See, e.g., https://www.lexisnexis.com/LegalNewsRoom/immigration/b/outsidenews/posts/crippling-uscis-work-permit-backlog-hurts-everyone.

Fixing it should have been “Day 1 Low Hanging Fruit” for the Biden Administration. After all, these are simple mostly “no-brainer adjudications” — such that they can barely be called “adjudications” at all. Basically, they require computerized records checks that most high school students probably could be trained to do efficiently in a few days. For example, the “adjudication” of an extension of work authorization is estimated to take about 12 minutes.

I’m old enough to remember the days “before the dreaded EAD” at the “Legacy INS.” Upon filing certain applications with the District Office, the officer simply stamped “Employment Authorized” on the individual’s paper I-94 card or in the passport and returned it to the applicant on the spot. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked and was reasonably prompt, practical, functional, and inexpensive to administer.

Now, there are 31 pages of instructions for filing an Application for Employment Authorization on Form I-765. Many categories require a rather bloated $410 filling fee and others require an $85 “biometrics fee,” thus making “EAD” issuance and renewal a “profit center” for supposedly largely self-supporting USCIS adjudications.

The only things missing from this “new improved process:” common sense, competence, efficiency, and, most of all, public service, despite Director Jaddou’s recent rewrite of the USCIS mission statement. I wish she’d spend less time thinking and talking about “public service” and more effort fixing the fairly obvious problems interfering with the actual daily delivery of public service by USCIS.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-18-22

🗽🙂🇺🇸👍🏼DOING IT RIGHT! — S. Portland, Maine Schools Welcome Refugees, Find Inspiration, Energy, Joy, Appreciation Rewarding As They Meet Challenges — “[T]he hardest thing they’ve ever experienced is behind them. So there’s this energy around these new students. They’re just so delighted to be here. They’re never absent. They’re excited every second of every day.”

https://www.pressherald.com/2022/01/30/new-arrivals-in-south-portland-schools-bring-challenges-and-joy/

SCHOOLS AND EDUCATION Posted 4:00 AM

New arrivals in South Portland schools bring challenges and joy

With asylum seekers arriving in Portland housed in South Portland hotels, South Portland schools gear up for more English language learners and celebrate the excitement they bring.

BY RACHEL OHMSTAFF WRITER

Divine Nsimba Lukombo 12, left, an 8th grader from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and 7th grader Odett Mavezo Junizi 12, also from the Congo, work together in a science class at South Portland’s Memorial Middle School.

When classes started this year at Memorial Middle School in South Portland, there was just one humanities class for students beginning to learn English. Now there are three.

The school has rearranged the schedules of English language teachers, added an additional part-time English language teacher and upped the hours of a second teacher.

It has limited new enrollments because it has no more space and is relying on the middle school on the other side of the city to absorb any additional students who come into the district.

“We’re just supporting way more kids in those English language learning classes,” said Principal Rebecca Stern.

RELATED

Portland officials ask for help as number of asylum seekers continues to grow

The changes are necessary because the school district is seeing an influx of English language learner students driven by the arrival of asylum seekers from African countries. It’s hard to know exactly how many of the students are asylum seekers, but officials in South Portland say the increases they’re seeing stem from the placement of many asylum-seeking families in emergency shelter in local hotels.

Since the start of the school year, the South Portland School Department has served 305 homeless students. That’s up from 180 last school year and just 34 in 2019-20. The school system has 522 English language learner students, compared to 328 last year. And overall enrollment now is at 3,021 students, up from 2,887 in October.

English Language Learner teacher Kara Kralik works with students at Memorial Middle School in South Portland last week. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

South Portland is one of five communities where the city of Portland is placing asylum seekers in hotels because of a shortage of shelter space and housing.

Portland officials reported earlier this month that new arrivals had driven the highest ever nightly averages of people in need of shelter. In the first three weeks of January, 39 families needing shelter arrived in Portland – about one-third the number the city saw in all of 2020.

School officials in Portland and some surrounding communities like Old Orchard Beach and Brunswick, which are currently housing asylum seekers or have in the past, said they aren’t seeing increases in new students. Freeport, which is housing some new arrivals from Portland, has seen a small one.

“I would argue that right now we are the most impacted school district in the state when it comes to new families, many of whom do not speak English and are housing vulnerable,” said South Portland Superintendent Tim Matheney.

Schools across the district – from elementary to high school – have mobilized to welcome the newcomers. Most come from Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo and have spent months or even years traveling to the United States to escape violence or instability in their home countries. And many have missed long periods of school as a result.

Portland officials ask for help as number of asylum seekers continues to grow

Teaching the students English, enrolling them in classes and making sure basic needs such as housing, food and warm clothing are being met present challenges. Schools need to hire more staff – English language teachers, social workers.

But the new students are making their schools far more diverse and filling them with excitement during a challenging year.

“In America right now, as we go through the pandemic and how education looks post-pandemic, people are really sad,” said South Portland High School Principal Michele LaForge. “The anxiety of our students and our staff is really high. This has been a really hard time and it continues to be hard.

“Our new Mainers, in a lot of ways, the hardest thing they’ve ever experienced is behind them. So there’s this energy around these new students. They’re just so delighted to be here. They’re never absent. They’re excited every second of every day.”

FILLING IN THE LEARNING GAPS

At Memorial Middle School on a recent morning, English language learner teacher Elizabeth Dawson worked with a dozen students in a math class for newcomers. Just the week before, Dawson had been assigned a new sixth-grade student who hadn’t been in school for five years. She said it’s not unusual for students to have large gaps in their education, and it’s her job to catch them up.

“In all of our classes we have this philosophy of addressing language skills and gaps, but we also know these students are 14,” Dawson said. “They’re cognitively and developmentally middle school students, so we also need to make sure our content is challenging them on a seventh-grade level.”

Tanya Nsumu, 12, left, originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo works with Maria Bikuma, 14, from Angola during math class last week at Memorial Middle School in South Portland where there is an influx of asylum-seeking students. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Maria Bikuma and Tanya Nsumu, two students in Dawson’s class, sat in the back munching on breakfast as their teacher led them in a word problem that everyone read aloud together. Bikuma, who is from Angola and arrived in Maine over the summer, said she is enjoying making new friends and being in school.

“I like America because it’s a good country,” said the eighth-grader. “I can study here and the teachers are good.”

Because she speaks English well, Bikuma often acts as a translator between teachers and her fellow students who are new to the country and whose first language is most often Portuguese or French. She said the teachers are patient and more involved in helping students than in Angola, where students were more self-directed.

“People understand quickly because the teachers explain very good,” Bikuma said.

Nsumu also arrived over the summer, from the Democratic Republic of Congo. She left her home country when she was just 6 years old and spent time in South America, Mexico and Texas. When she arrived in Maine, she spoke no English, though that has quickly changed.

“Here is different because I have a new teacher that teaches good,” said the seventh-grader. “I have an iPad. I have a new life.”

. . . .

*******************

Read the rest of Rachel’s article at the link.

When I was a judge, I was often inspired by the amazing young people who came before me. Some of them had literally walked to the US, on perilous journeys, encountering unimaginable, sometimes unspeakable, hardships and trauma.

Their courage, life skills, and problem solving abilities were truly remarkable. Once here, many were helping their families while going to school and assisting their lawyers with their cases. Some were also involved in sports, music, or other extracurricular activities. (When I heard applause from my colleague Judge John Milo Bryant’s courtroom, I knew that was for another student-athlete or academic achievement.)

I often could see both English language proficiency and school grades improve from one court appearance to another. I invariably asked students about their progress in school. Many brought report cards to the next hearing to show me how they were doing.

I always told kids that no matter how their cases eventually came out, their education was theirs for life. So, I challenged them to take full advantage. And, most appeared to do so!

I saw some of them literally grow up and come of age in court and go on to contribute to our country and our communities while continuing to take outsized responsibilities for families. Many came from homes where the parents were both working two jobs to help forge better lives for their children.

Many of these cases eventually had happy endings. When they did, I always encouraged the younger generation to pay it back by helping their parents and insuring that they had the time, encouragement, and support to meet the requirements for naturalization so that they could become full participants in their communities and our nation.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-30-22

🌽🥔🍠🌶🥑FOOD MATTERS! — PORTLAND FOOD PANTRY CATERS TO IMMIGRANT, ETHNIC COMMUNITIES IN MAINE!

https://www.pressherald.com/2021/11/21/a-portland-food-program-learns-what-foods-immigrants-in-need-want-most/

Gillian Graham reports for the Portland Press Herald:

During the five years Betsy Paz-Gyimesi has been working as an interpreter and engagement specialist for Spanish-speaking families in Portland schools, she has seen the same scene play out many times.

When they go for help to a food pantry, they’re offered food they will not eat. Some are afraid of canned foods because they believe they are dangerous. Others have cultural or religious needs that aren’t met by the American items on the pantry shelves.

Most of the families Paz-Gyimesi works with come from Central America, and they don’t all qualify for benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and other similar programs. Because there are few options for them at the food pantry, their children often rely heavily on schools for meals, Paz-Gyimesi said.

But that will begin to change next month as Wayside Food Programs in Portland launches a pilot program to better address food insecurity in immigrant communities by providing food packs customized to the needs and preferences of those receiving emergency assistance.

Working with leaders of immigrant communities, Wayside developed lists of basic pantry items they commonly use and a guide to their specific food preferences that can be used by other food programs, said Mary Zwolinski, Wayside’s executive director.

“Our hope is that it helps with the issue of food equity,” she said.

The pandemic, which has disproportionately impacted Maine’s racial and ethnic minorities, laid bare that the state’s existing emergency food structure was not adequately serving all of their needs. Some of the people most vulnerable to hunger didn’t access existing food programs. When they did, many did not find food – Jasmine rice, dried fish, pork-free products – that fit their cultural, religious and dietary restrictions and preferences.

. . . .

******************************

Nice effort! Maine has been a bastion of community cooperation, creative encouragement of, and positive interaction with immigrant communities! Seems like a good model that can be replicated throughout America. Read the full article at the link!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-22-21

😎🗽👍🏼 HOW MAINE HELPS ASYLUM SEEKERS HELP THEMSELVES & HUMANITY — It’s A “Win-Win” That Can Be Replicated!

uhttps://www.pressherald.com/2021/11/14/we-bring-our-dreams-with-us-all-of-us/

Eric Russell in the Portland (ME) Press Herald:

. . . .

Jobs are more plentiful and increasingly well-paying, but asylum seekers can’t work for at least six months, sometimes longer – a willing and able workforce sidelined. They also can’t qualify right away for federal assistance programs like food stamps.

Every so often, staff members hear rumblings from someone in the community who suggests that asylum seekers are being helped at the expense of others, which isn’t true.

“There isn’t anything offered to them that isn’t offered to anyone else who walks through our door,” Guthrie said. “If someone presents, we try to help them.”

. . . .

*******************

With chronic labor shortages, Maine has benefitted greatly from doing the right thing, setting a great, positive example that could and should be a model for other states. Helping everyone to realize their ambitions and reach their full human potential is the way forward!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-16-21

PORTLAND (ME) PRESS HERALD: “The only thing that can save people escaping the cruelty of war is the kindness of strangers.” — Why Maine & Every Other State Should Welcome Afghan Refugees!

https://www.pressherald.com/2021/10/08/maine-voices-afghan-refugees-should-get-the-same-welcome-america-gave-me/

MAINE VOICES Posted Yesterday at 4:00 AM

Maine Voices: Afghan refugees should get the same welcome America gave me

The only thing that can save people escaping the cruelty of war is the kindness of strangers.

BY REZA JALALI SPECIAL TO THE PRESS HERALD

To be honest, no one chooses to be a refugee.

Nobody wakes up one morning and decides to leave everything familiar behind, including their loved ones, to live in limbo for years, without valid papers, hoping a country would offer to resettle them. I did not.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Reza Jalali is the executive director of the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center. His latest book, “Dear Maine: The Trials and Triumphs of Maine’s 21st Century Immigrants,” co-written with Morgan Rielly, will be out soon.

Fresh out of college, I was planning to return to Iran, where I was born, to reunite with my family when the 1979 Islamic Revolution, followed by the war with neighboring Iraq, caused turmoil there. These events made me a stateless person, with no country to which I could return.

Years earlier, I had gone to India, to study engineering; I was innocent of the world’s cruelty and life was mostly peaceful and good. Once the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in India, provided me with the refugee status, I applied for admission to the United States, as a refugee. Without a sponsor or a relative in America, I was sent to Portland for resettlement.

When I got to Portland, my new “home,” it felt like a sweet dream. To my tired eyes, the electric light seemed brighter and the sky looked bluer. Kind strangers offered housing, rides, and assistance to find a job. With hope, and faith in America, tucked away in my heart, where no personal doubt, or hostile looks could reach and touch, I started to build a new life. Like many others, I believed then, and still do, that America’s strength has been its willingness to add more chairs to the proverbial table.

My story, far from being unique, represents a reality in a world that is broken and re-broken now and again. The world is a dangerous place for the innocent civilians, including women and children. Today, there are some 80 million refugees, displaced internally or pushed out of their countries of birth. According to UNHCR “every minute 20 people leave everything behind to escape war, persecution or terror.”

Calamities, such as the one unfolding in Afghanistan now, after its sudden fall to the Taliban, show how chaotic our world is. Refugees are the byproduct of wars. It’d help if those against helping refugees were to oppose invasions and our government’s support for ruthless dictators, for the sake of access to cheap energy and national security.

Refugees, by their mere presence, in our communities, even when invisible to some, tell the stories of courage and human resilience. They also remind us of the cruelty of human beings at times of conflict and yet the kindness and compassion of strangers in receiving and helping them to feel safe and a chance to start new lives.

RELATED

Read Thursday’s Maine Voices: NECEC corridor isn’t perfect, but it is needed now

Across cities in the U.S. and in Maine, refugees, asylum seekers, migrant workers and immigrants are building, repairing, healing, teaching, growing food, creating art and so on. They are adding to the richness of the symphony we call America. And that is the central plot of the American story, for unless you come from a Native American tribe, you are either an immigrant, or were stolen in Africa and brought to America, as a slave.

In the weeks to come, as a former refugee, I will be unfurling the welcome mat and keeping open the same door, that let me and others before me in, for the expected Afghan refugees, many of whom had risked their lives helping Americans fighting in Afghanistan. Here at the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center, in partnership with other nonprofits and others, we will offer a helping hand by teaching the Afghan refugees English remotely and supporting them to enter the workforce, when they are ready. As proper hosts, that’s the least we could do: small acts of love done for the sake of repairing our broken world.

***************

As CMS studies have proved over and over, refugees of all types are a huge benefit to our nation! But, that’s really “icing on the cake.” Even if refugees weren’t such a great economic benefit, that wouldn’t lessen our obligations to save them and give them shelter.

In the Afghan situation, our obligations ar increased by our involvement in their country.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-08-21

🇺🇸🗽MAINELY HELPFUL: Maine Immigration Attorneys, Communities Reach Out To Afghan Refugees, Even As Evacuation Ends With Far Too Many Left Behind! — Our Obligation To Help Refugees Does Not End With The Last Troop Departure!

From the Portland Press Herald:

https://www.pressherald.com/2021/08/30/afghans-attorneys-in-maine-anxiously-work-to-help-families-evacuate-by-deadline/

LOCAL & STATE Posted 4:00 AM

Afghans, attorneys in Maine anxiously work to help families evacuate by deadline

With the evacuation deadline looming Tuesday, Afghan Americans in Maine and their lawyers struggle to bring loved ones to safety.

BY KELLEY BOUCHARDSTAFF WRITER

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Masuma Sayed, a member of Maine’s Afghan-American community, is struggling to help family members flee Afghanistan before Aug. 31. Ben McCanna/Staff Photographer

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A trio of parakeets fills Masuma Sayed’s home in Portland with soft tweets as she recalls her recent visit to Afghanistan.

She returned to her native city of Kandahar in May, her first trip back in 28 years. She visited her mother’s grave, where as a teenager she would release birds that she bought in a shop on the way to the cemetery. Her mother loved birds, and so does she.

Sayed, 43, did not release birds when she was at her mother’s grave in May. Her heart was heavy, burdened by the memory of the evening that Taliban members burst into her family’s home and killed her mother and older sister, leaving behind their bullet-riddled bodies. Her sister was targeted because she was about to marry a soldier in the ruling government.

Her mother’s last words were whispered pleas to cover her sister’s face and bring her a cup of water.

Through the years, Sayed has lost 10 family members at the hands of the Taliban, including a brother-in-law and his brother, who were killed in June because they worked as contractors with U.S. forces. She’s trying to save more than 20 family members from a similar fate.

“Now I am the voice of my family,” Sayed said. “They cannot speak for themselves.”

Sayed is among a small but committed group of Afghan Americans, immigration lawyers and other Mainers who are anxiously trying to help evacuate people from Afghanistan by Tuesday’s deadline. There are about 50 to 70 Afghan families in Maine, or about 500 people, some of whom came here after helping U.S.-led forces oust the Taliban from power in 2001.

It’s a frustrating, confusing and rapidly changing situation that has called for extraordinary collaboration and sharing information across the country and the globe. Social service agencies and church groups in Maine are pitching in, doing what they can to provide assistance from 6,500 miles away.

“We know there is a huge humanitarian crisis going on and a lot of people in need,” said Sally Cloutier, chief operating officer at The Opportunity Alliance, a social service agency in Portland.

The Opportunity Alliance hosted a Zoom meeting last Thursday with Afghan Americans and other Mainers who are desperately trying to assist in the evacuation. Cloutier and her staff offered to support Afghan families in their efforts and pledged to hold a follow-up meeting this week to learn what more can be done.

. . . .

Jennifer Atkinson Esquire — Jennifer Atkinson, Esquire
Damariscotta, ME
PHOTO: Law firm

“This is a rapidly evolving and extremely fluid situation,” said Jennifer Atkinson, an immigration lawyer in Damariscotta who is helping a Portland family that is trying to get loved ones out of Afghanistan.

“We’re certainly learning every day, every hour,” said Philip Mantis, legal director at the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project in Portland.Without necessary paperwork, financial resources and commercial flights, getting out of Afghanistan is extremely difficult and dangerous, the lawyers explained.

Atkinson, who is helping her Portland clients pro bono, said she was discussing various options with them, including how their family members might “go to ground” and stay safe while in hiding. Trying to get out through Pakistan or other border crossings would be extremely “dicey,” Atkinson said.

One Afghan woman spoke tearfully during the meeting through an interpreter. She said her husband and son were waiting at Kabul’s airport, and that a nephew had been seriously injured but was unable to get medical care amid the chaos.

Immediately after the meeting, Atkinson put the woman in touch with an organization that is connecting Afghans who need medical care with doctors and nurses who are still in Afghanistan and willing to help. As of Friday, the boy was on his way to a hospital. Further information was unavailable.

“People are coming out of the woodwork to help,” Atkinson said. “We’re all trying to do everything we can to get people out.”

Atkinson said an email network has developed, including immigration lawyers and others across the United States and beyond, who are trying to expedite evacuations. All are searching for clear, verifiable information on how to get documentation and secure a safe flight out of the region.

RELATED

A Bates College senior from Kabul helps save her family from the Taliban

“We’re getting information second or third hand, so we’re never sure exactly what’s going on,” Atkinson said. “Many of us are acting as travel agents as well as attorneys.”

Margaret Stock, Esquire
Anchorage, Alaska
PHOTO: Law firm

One person providing clarity and straight answers on that email network is Margaret Stock, an immigration and citizenship attorney in Anchorage, Alaska. She’s also a retired Army lieutenant colonel and a top expert in noncombatant evacuation operations like the one that’s been happening in Afghanistan.

Stock said the U.S. government has spent million of dollars developing strategies and training personnel to properly plan and execute evacuations of U.S. citizens and allies when ending a military action or withdrawing from a threatened area. The Department of Defense published a 200-page manual on how to do it in 2010 and updated it in 2015.

“They don’t seem to be following the manual,” Stock said Thursday in a phone interview.

Stock said the manual calls for various government branches and nongovernmental organizations to form a planning task force as soon as an evacuation date is known. The Trump administration negotiated a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban in February 2020 that excluded the Afghan government, freed 5,000 imprisoned Taliban soldiers and set May 1, 2021, as the final withdrawal date.

Stock said she helped the Department of Homeland Security organize the first task force-type planning meeting for the Afghanistan operation, which was held last Wednesday. The Department of Defense wasn’t included, she said.

“They should have had that meeting a long time ago,” Stock said. “I was asking them to have it back in February. The minute (former President Trump) said we were going to pull out, they should have started planning.”

Some aspects of the evacuation seem to have gone relatively well so far, Stock said, such as the actual military airlifts out of Kabul. But the United States shouldn’t have given up Bagram Air Base, which would have been a more secure airlift center than Kabul’s airport, she said. And it should have developed a comprehensive roster of everyone who needed to be evacuated and how best to get them out.

Stock also questioned why U.S. citizens were allowed to travel to Afghanistan as the evacuation date neared, including a group of exchange students. And she noted the lack of planning for special circumstances, such as young children who might lack necessary passports. Last week, an Afghan woman was turned away at the airport because her baby, a U.S. citizen by her American husband, didn’t have a passport, Stock said.

“There’s a lot of fear right now,” Stock said. “People are facing a terrible decision to sit tight and hope things get better, or try to get to the airport and hope to get out.”

. . . .

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Read the complete article at the link.

Maine has been welcoming to refugees from all countries. And, with good reason! The Maine economy is heavily dependent on the skills of refugees and other migrants.

Sadly, too many we might have saved were left behind. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/08/30/evacuation-may-be-ending-americas-responsibility-afghan-friends-left-behind-is-not/

While our military is out, the human trauma is still unfolding. The refugee flow is likely to continue long after the fall of Afghanistan, just as it did with with Vietnam, at the time I started my Government service at the Legacy INS. The inadequacy of the procedures then in effect led to the Refugee Act of 1980.

Our current effort is hampered by the illegal and immoral destruction of the refugee admission program by Trump nativists. But, the Biden Administration has been dilatory in restoring functionality, and has disturbingly failed to maximize the use of all available tools and avenues for refugee admissions under the Refugee Act of 1980.

Spojmie Nasiri, Esquire
San Francisco, CA
PHOTO: Law firmQ!

Spojmie Nasiri, an Afghan American immigration attorney in the Bay Area, said several of her clients are stuck in Kabul and more resources are needed to assist those arriving in the U.S.

“You don’t get people out in 11 days,” she said. “We’re going to see the catastrophe of this for decades to come.”

https://click.email.latimes.com/?qs=eb18f936dca65058507db94589f8ea73bec2984425c8abd1eeacda7d2444113f9420d386225ad486181085b4bed866c4cf2d22683ccc8d6c

Tragically, Afghan allies who trusted our Government might well pay with their lives for our failure to live up to our promises and obligations.

🇺🇸🗽Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-31-21

MAINE’S BRIGHT FUTURE IN A GLOBAL SOCIETY DEPENDS ON ROBUST IMMIGRATION & WELCOMING ATTITUDES! — Professor Joseph W. McDonnell Writes In The Portland Press Gazette

News Day in Maine — Let’s Hope That A New Day Is Dawning , Fueled by Immigrants, For Maine & America After 4 Years of Unrelenting Darkness. The Biden Administration Must Help By Re-establishing Our Legal Asylum Program!

https://www.pressherald.com/2021/05/12/maine-voices-new-u-s-intelligence-report-suggests-how-maine-can-address-global-trends-2/

Maine Voices: New U.S. intelligence report suggests how Maine can address global trends

We’re in a good position to improve the lives of people without college degrees, to welcome foreigners to a democratic society and to diversify our workforce.

. . . .

The Global Trends report provides analysis but not policy solutions. Maine could assist by demonstrating that democracy can work here by taking steps to bridge the ideological divide and reduce political polarization. Maine can become a welcoming state for immigrants by easing their entry into the workforce to replace our retiring baby boomers.

Maine can also develop public-private partnerships to teach workforce skills that raise incomes and improve the quality of life for those without a college degree. Finally, Maine can exercise soft power by welcoming foreigners as tourists and recruiting students from China to our high schools and universities, offering an opportunity to experience a democratic society with both its flaws and freedoms, and to forge friendships between the two contested countries.

Joseph W. McDonnell is a professor of public policy and management at the Edmund S. Muskie School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine

********************

You can read Professor McDonnell’s article (along with a couple of comments that show exactly why our hope for the future has to be in immigrants — not that the commenters probably weren’t immigrants of some sort at some point in our history).

B/T/W Congresswoman Omar (D-MN) is a naturalized U.S. citizen — an example of someone who not only immigrated, survived racial and religious bigotry and bullying in school, graduated from college, established a successful career as an educator and civic advocate, and further had the courage and commitment (which most native-born Americans, including me, do not) to successfully seek elective office and work through the system to make America a better place for all, regardless of whether or not one agrees with all of her views.

The vast majority of immigrants of any status “learn the language” (many better than some native-born U.S. citizens) and become at least bi-lingual if not tri-lingual, a skill set that few native-born Americans achieve.

Of course, in an intentionally diverse society, important Government documents should be printed in languages that individuals are most comfortable with. You might have become proficient in French in college, but if involved in a legal dispute in France, most of us would need and expect an English translation to be sure we understood and, in turn, were understood.

I knew enough German to study in Germany during college. I was comfortable going down to the local watering spot and ordering “bauernbrat mit kraut und bier.” But, if I had been involved in a legal proceeding, I wouldn’t have dared to proceed in German.

Also, although undoubtedly some students and foreign workers are exploited by the American system, overall they make huge contributions to both education and our workforce. As an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown Law, my classes are continually enriched by the presence of foreign students and scholars, many of whom are willing to share their own immigration stories and to enlighten us on the culture and legal system they experienced.

Also, if we have learned anything during the pandemic, it is how very dependent we are on our immigrant and ethnic communities, regardless of “status,” for essential workers. The “exploitation” is an “American home grown problem,” not one caused by immigrants! As a society, we need to stop “shooting the messenger!”

Where we spend much of our summers, Boothbay Harbor in the “Mid-Coast Region of Maine,” the tourism, hospitality, recreational, and resort industries that power this town are highly dependent on talented foreign workers. Their upbeat attitudes, eagerness to learn and contribute, and fascinating multiculturalism is one of the primary factors that comes bursting out in town and throughout this area, making this one of the best summer tourist locations in America. (Obviously, it’s “world famous,” since these folks seek to come here from literally around the world.)

I remember commenting several summers ago about the amazing refugee assistance and appreciation programs generated by the local religious community here in Boothbay Harbor, as well as the impressive social justice awareness and activism of some of the talented local artists who performed at a fundraiser for refugees and asylum seekers. http://immigrationcourtside.com/2019/07/15/the-new-due-process-army-is-alive-and-well-in-boothbay-harbor-singer-songwriter-john-schindler-friends-inspire-uplift-with-benefit-concert-for-maines-immigrant-legal-advocacy-pr/

Our “next-door neighbors,” here on beautiful Linekin Bay, Larry and Janey Anderson, were long time year around residents of Maine before retiring to “warmer climes” near their family (and us) in Northern Virginia. They were very involved with the African refugee community in Southern Maine, calling me several times for advice on how to get legal help on asylum cases. I well remember on occasions hearing the rhythm of a “drum circle” in which Larry participated with his refugee friends coming from the Anderson cabin.

It actually made me feel good about the lives I had been able to save and the positive progressive legal changes, precedents, and attitudes that I was able to help, at least in some modest way, forge over a 40+ year career in immigration and human rights, most of it with the U.S. Government.

Of course, I was fortunate enough to have retired in 2016, before the institutionalized White Nationalist, racist, misogynistic, xenophobia of the Trump regime arrived. Unfortunately, they undid some of the hard work that many of us had done to improve the system, further due process, and insure fairness and humane treatment for foreign nationals under U.S. laws.

However, the lives we were able to save (yesterday’s post about my Arlington Immigration Court/Round Table colleague Judge Joan Churchill and our joint NDPA colleague Deb Sanders is an example) have remained saved! “A life saved, is a life saved,” as I always say! https://immigrationcourtside.com/2021/05/12/ndpa-all-star-debi-sanders-round-table-judge-ret-joan-churchill-featured-in-story-of-inspiring-immigrant-sumera-haque-her-family-from-george-bushs-recent-book-out-of-many-one/

The folks we welcomed under the law, their families, and their descendants continue to make America great despite all the destructive actions and false, misleading hate rhetoric promoted by Tump and his party.

Now, it’s up to the “new generation” of the NDPA to seize the baton and lead the fight to assist migrants of all types in creating a new and better day for Maine, America, and the world! I actually just had inspiring conversations this week with “two of the best out there” in the private/NGO sectors who are competing for positions at EOIR to help return due process, efficiency, practicality, and humanity to a disgracefully dysfunctional and unfair system. These are the folks who are “inspiring a new day for America.” They have already got Professor McDonnell’s message and are working to make it a reality!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-13-21

🇺🇸LOOKING FORWARD TO JAN 20: How The Biden Administration Can Reach Out To Rural America & Bring Our Nation Back Together! — Rural & Urban Areas Need Each Other To Maximize Growth & Prosper In The Future!

https://www.pressherald.com/2020/12/30/commentary-how-to-make-federal-policy-work-for-maine-and-other-rural-places/

Rob Riley in the Portland (ME) Press Herald:

. . . .

President-elect Joe Biden, who pledged to serve all Americans, can respond boldly to address the needs of large swaths of rural America where people feel left behind. In the first 100 days of his administration, he can prove that he wants to see real change and will act to secure broader prosperity.

Drawing on more than 20 years of working in communities across four rural states, we see actionable, specific opportunities for Biden to make federal policy work for rural places. Here’s what we recommend:

• Engage in genuine conversations in rural places about the role of the federal government. The pandemic aside, fundamental economic changes, limited career pathways and crumbling (or non-existent) infrastructure plague many rural places. These challenges require public-private partnerships, directed by local needs and leadership. Many of the federal programs designed to address the underlying issues in rural places fail because they were designed for the rural reality of 1960, not of today. Let’s get current, understand why programs aren’t working and make them better.

• Elevate rural to the level it deserves in the president’s Cabinet. Rural places are currently served through a web of programs spread across numerous federal agencies. One might think this approach would help address policy deficiencies, but in fact, when everyone is in charge, no one is. The Biden administration can send a strong message that it means business by putting someone clearly in charge of its rural agenda and creating a new Department of Rural Development dedicated to improving, centralizing, and deploying the support and services necessary for rural people and places to thrive.

• Invest in doing economic development differently in rural places. Federal employees work diligently on their mission, providing grants and other services to constituents as directed by statute. And yet, the available tools for solving complicated, systemic and immediate issues are limited. To do economic development differently – and better – we need to eliminate programs that have limited utility, expand others that focus on building capacity in rural places, increase the flexible application of federal dollars and move the measurement of economic development outcomes beyond one-dimensional (and fleeting) metrics like job creation.

• Focus on and communicate about rural-urban connections rather than the divide. Rural places don’t benefit from being talked about as a monolith, a backwater or fly-over country. Rather, we as a nation need to raise up narratives and policies that recognize differences in rural places across the country, and that celebrate and support the natural, community, and economic assets that define those communities and their relationship to nearby urban areas. The stereotype of the American dream is changing. We now have a tapestry of rural, suburban and urban, and an opportunity to focus on collective prosperity rather than competition, exclusion and negative trade-offs.

The first hundred days will show how the Biden presidency will serve all Americans. Yes, there is a pandemic raging, but the widening gulf between rural and urban, rich and poor, red and blue requires a new tone, a new path and new solutions. Let’s get to it.

Rob Riley is president of the Northern Forest Center, a regional innovation and investment partner that creates rural vibrancy across Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and New York. The center co-founded the national Rural Development Innovation Group with the Aspen Institute and the U.S. Endowment for Forestry & Communities.

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Read Rob’s full article at the link.

These are great, and timely ideas. They also present an outstanding opportunity to use the power of immigration to make our country a better place for everyone.

Immigrant entrepreneurs, small businesspeople, and investors can pool their ideas, skills, and resources with rural communities. Innovative rural Americans can help redesign and tailor methods that have worked in other countries for the American situation.

Immigrants with experience in agriculture and product marketing can help alleviate some of the labor shortages in rural areas.

Immigrants with tech skills can partner with rural Americans to help insure that, rather than sometimes being left behind, rural areas are on the cutting edge of accessible, high speed, state of the art technology that will integrate many educational and commercial activities with those now centered in “urban hubs.” (For example, why couldn’t a high tech area in rural America where land and housing are cheaper and a skilled (or highly motivated and trainable) workforce is eager for work be just as effective as Crystal City, VA as the next big tech hub?)

Immigrants with health service backgrounds can assist even more rural communities in insuring that first-class healthcare (and the jobs and economic opportunities it creates) is available everywhere in America.

My experience is that immigrants of all types, like rural Americans, highly value education, particularly for future generations. Innovative educational programs can be developed to meet the common needs of immigrant and rural communities.

There are just a few of the opportunities that come to mind. Obviously, I’m not a labor economist. But, I’m sure that if immigrant advocates concentrate on ways to actively engage and integrate immigrants into solving problems and improving the quality of life in rural and small-town America there are many other great opportunities for success out there just waiting to be tapped.

Immigrants have always been “part of the solution” rather than “part of the problem” in America. After four years of counterproductive unrestrained bigotry, false narratives, and hate-driven lies, its time for “truth, justice, and the American way” to come to the forefront again.

🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-02-21

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD: “Maine Voices: Refugees know what it means to live with uncertainty”

“Maine Daybreak”
Photo by Paul Wickham Schmidt

https://www.pressherald.com/2020/05/27/maine-voices-refugees-know-what-it-takes-to-live-with-uncertainty/?utm_source=Headlines&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Daily&mc_cid=b954215681&mc_eid=db76bf0a33

As we all cope with the COVID crisis, we can learn a lesson in resiliency.

BY EKHLAS AHMED SPECIAL TO THE PRESS HERALD

In 2005, on my first day of school in America, I got off at the wrong bus stop. Days before, my family and I moved to Portland, having fled genocide in our native Darfur, Sudan. I was 11 years old, had never ridden a public bus before and couldn’t speak English. I walked around lost for eight hours until the Portland police finally found me. I’m now 26, and I think the most courageous thing I’ve ever done is to get back on that bus the next day.

I’ve thought about this story a lot during the pandemic. Like everyone, I feel the uncertainty and pain of this moment. But when I remember the struggles I’ve overcome as a refugee and newcomer to America, I am reminded of how resilient human beings are. You certainly don’t have to be a refugee in order to know perseverance, but take it from someone who has been displaced, lost and in fear of her life: we can get through this. Here’s how.

First, find your purpose by serving others. Given the trauma that refugees have experienced, you wouldn’t expect us to be so resilient. But we forge ahead by reaching out. It’s no surprise that healthcare is the second most common field for refugees in the U.S., according to New American Economy. A fifth of refugee healthcare workers are personal care aides, 14 percent are registered nurses and 8 percent are doctors. Refugees fill these rolls, because we want to give back to the country that welcomed us. But we also do it because selflessness eases our suffering. I became an ESOL teacher five years ago because I knew I would be in a unique position to help young newcomers. I’ve walked in their shoes and understand how to build a safe learning environment for them to thrive.

Second, find hope in community. In refugee circles, even those of us who aren’t strictly “essential” are lifting our neighbors up through mutual-aid organizing. This is a type of local support that refugee communities use to fill in the gaps after our resettlement assistance ends. In normal times, networks of neighbors might organize ride shares and translation assistance for newcomers. Now we’ve added services to meet changing demands. Before coronavirus hit Portland, there was no existing infrastructure to get groceries to the elderly and people with pre-existing conditions. To meet that need, myself and other volunteers are doing the shopping for them. I’m also hosting virtual information meetings to keep the refugee community up-to-date on the latest coronavirus guidelines and teaching people how to use services like Zoom so they can participate and keep up with friends and family.

Lastly, don’t keep your fear bottled up. Refugees know how important it is to have an outlet to express our feelings. This is true for so many of us who have experienced trauma, but especially the women who suffered sexual violence during war. That’s why my mom is a care provider at Spurwink, a Portland organization that helps individuals affected by mental health challenges and developmental disabilities. And it’s why I started hosting bi-monthly conference calls for anyone who wants to share their pandemic experiences. Given widespread job loss, food insecurity and the inability to pay the rent, it’s no wonder that experts are warning about the profound impact coronavirus will also have on our mental health. Talking to your friends and neighbors or simply lending an ear is crucial to breaking through the isolation. It reminds us that we are not alone.

If coronavirus has taught me anything, it’s that we all have far more in common than we think. As states begin to slowly reopen in the coming weeks and months, we will need each other more than ever. Refugees are used to approaching challenges day by day, because tomorrow has never been promised to us. We are proof that all Mainers—and all Americans—can persist through this crisis and adapt to our new normal. We may feel lost, but tomorrow is another day. Have courage.

Ekhlas Ahmed is a refugee, activist and educator from Darfur, Sudan.

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A message from the real America, and those who actually make it great!

The current regime has basically (without legislation) ended our compliance with domestic laws and international treaties that save refugee lives while humanizing and enriching our nation. It’s a national disgrace! Vote ‘em out, vote ‘em out!

This November, vote like your life and your humanity depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

05-29-30

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